The Latest: Suit: Keep Confederate monument at courthouse

October 20, 2017

FILE - In this Nov. 4, 2011 file photo, Sean Bordelon, left, and Raphiel Heard, of Shreveport, pause after reading the inscription on the Confederate soldier's monument in front of the Caddo Parish Courthouse in Shreveport, La. Local officials have voted to remove the Confederate monument from the courthouse grounds in the northwest Louisiana parish. The Caddo Parish Commission voted 7-5 for the measure on Thursday, Oct. 19, 2017, after hearing nearly two hours of opinions about the monument erected 111 years ago in a parish once called "Bloody Caddo" because so many African-Americans were killed during Reconstruction. (Douglas Collier /The Shreveport Times via AP)

The United Daughters of the Confederacy has asked a federal court to keep a Confederate monument outside a northwest Louisiana courthouse.

The Shreveport chapter erected the monument in 1906 at the Caddo Parish Courthouse.

News media report that the chapter went to court late Thursday, using an after-hours procedure for filing federal lawsuits.

The lawsuit alleges that removing the statuary group would violate the organization’s rights to free speech, due process and equal treatment under the law.

It names as defendants the commission and the seven individual commissioners who voted to remove the ornate monument. The memorial includes a larger-than-life statue of a young Confederate soldier, a life-sized statue of the muse of history pointing to a remembrance book and busts of four Confederate generals.

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Local officials have voted to remove a Confederate monument from the courthouse grounds in a northwest Louisiana parish.

News media report that the Caddo Parish Commission voted 7-5 for the measure on Thursday after hearing nearly two hours of opinions about the monument erected 111 years ago in Shreveport. A motion to have voters decide the matter failed 5-7.

American Civil Liberties Union of Louisiana executive director Marjorie Esman says the decision shows Shreveport is a place where freedom and equality are valued.

The monument won’t be removed soon. Legal challenges are likely. And the commission has not decided where the monument should be moved, or how to take it down in a way that will let it be re-erected somewhere else.